Irving Robbin(1918-2010)
- Music Department
- Composer
- Sound Department
Emmy Award-winning composer Irving Robbin pursued his musical education
entirely in his birthplace, New York City where he graduated from
Stuyvesant High School with a background in physics and chemistry.
Originally trained as a pianist, he left that pursuit in his late teens
for the broader and more creative field of composition. His theoretical
studies were at the music school of the YMHA, where he also studied
composition with Horace Grenell. Grenell sent the young composer to the
Juilliard School of Music for advanced studies, and to be auditioned by
the renowned American composer Roy Harris, who accepted him as a
classroom student and, after several months of work, granted him a
personal scholarship. Robbin worked with Harris for several years and
began to develop his personal style. His earliest works were performed
in New York, and the "Sinfonia No. 1" was taken on a national tour by
conductor Edwin MacArthur. A set of short dramatic pieces was written
for the Office of War Information in 1942 and recorded by the brass
section of the New York Philharmonic. Afer military service in World
War II, Robbin returned to New York, started a family, and began to
explore and expand his own approach to the art of writing music. In
addition to compositions for concert presentation, he has written
extensively for television and film, holds five Emmy nominations, and
in 1980 was the recipient of an Emmy award for original music for
television drama. He has had a long career as a music director in
radio, television, and film. He has been a guest lecturer at New York
University, the University of Missouri, and the Encore Program at
Orange County Community College. Irving Robbin has had his music
performed in the United States, Europe, South America, Central America,
Russia and Japan, and has conducted his own orchestral works on many
occasions. In the summer of 1982 he was invited to be a guest artist at
the "Sessione Senese per la Musica e L'Arte" at the University of Siena
in Italy, where he conducted the premiere of his "Essays for Small
Orchestra". From 1983 to 1986, he taught composition at their summer
sessions following an invitation to join the faculty. He has conducted
his own works in such diverse places as St. Petersburg, Russia; Siena,
Italy; Toledo, Ohio; Ann Arbor, Michigan; New York City; and Munich,
Germany. A resident of Chester in Orange County, New York for more than
thirty years, he has produced a chamber recital series in Sugar Loaf,
NY and served as composer-in-residence of the Highlands Symphony
Orchestra since its incorporation in 1988.